When planning a pavement project, such as a roadway construction project (e.g., gravel, asphalt, concrete, and the like), it may be desirable to obtain detailed surface data prior to introducing the paving material to a surface. For instance, a contractor on a roadway construction site may desire accurate, absolute positional data of the surface in order to prepare a subgrade for the roadway or to provide data of a surface to be resurfaced, in order to estimate an amount of paving material required for the pavement project, and the like. Further, the importance of pavement planning is becoming more evident as contractors realize that well-planned pavement operations are cost effective. Contractors desire to analyze the subgrade of the road surface and/or an existing road surface before the pavement of the road or resurfacing of the road is completed for various reasons. For example, contractors can save paving material, reduce the cost of concrete slabs, and reduce the cost of road surface modifications if they predict an overall estimated volume of paving material based on subgrade conditions.
However, the process of obtaining detailed surface data, including absolute positional data, often requires substantial time/labor associated with gathering the data. Moreover, the data that is obtained may include errors (e.g., human recording error) which would detract from the reliability of calculations which rely upon the positional data. Further, the data that may be obtained may not provide comprehensive data coverage of a surface, thereby providing an incomplete data record.
It is therefore desirable to provide a surface data measurement system and/or method to obtain detailed, reliable, and comprehensive surface data, including absolute positional data without the substantial time/labor associated with gathering the data provided by known manual methods.